


Somebody Told Me

by crinklefries



Series: All These Things I've Done [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Sports, Enemies to Lovers, Football Captain Bucky Barnes, Football Captain Steve Rogers, Football | Soccer, Inspired by Twitter, M/M, Rivals to Lovers, locker room handjobs, the beautiful game, the sexual tension between two men who hate each other in sports
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-01-11
Packaged: 2021-03-16 03:01:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,353
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28699572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crinklefries/pseuds/crinklefries
Summary: “I’m sure you’ve heard,” the reporter insists. “What James Barnes has been saying about the game. About you, in particular. Have you had any contact with him?”Steve doesn’tglareat the room of reporters, but that’s not to say the intensity of his stare wouldn’t set all of their notepads on fire if it could.“No,” he says, stiffly. “James Barnes and I don’t talk and frankly, I’m not interested in what he has to say. Talk is talk. If he wants to show me how superior he is, he can meet me on the field.”*Steve Rogers and James Barnes are heated, bitter, rival captains for rival football (soccer) clubs.But there is a fine line between hate and lust and all's fair in love and football.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Series: All These Things I've Done [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2102379
Comments: 44
Kudos: 322





	Somebody Told Me

**Author's Note:**

> Maybe I ONLY write short fics now. Happy 2021!!!!!
> 
> jk, this was supposed to be the next installment of the "100 words location + trope" Twitter prompt meme and instead it's about 6,000 words. So I will never learn, but in the meantime, I have been promising so many people a footie AU for so long.
> 
> Bon appetit!!!
> 
> The prompt, given by the lovely @MarzYera on Twitter, was " **press conference + enemies to lovers**."

*

“Steve, you played a remarkable game out there,” the reporter says. He’s a middle-aged white man with thinning brown hair and a smile that’s too toothy by half. “There’s been a lot of rumors circulating about your position on the team—I mean, you had a few rough injuries last year, some slow starts to this season. Your age...well, I don’t want to be insulting.”

There’s a light smattering of awkward laughter. Steve’s eyebrow twitches.

“Certain people have...insinuated that maybe it’s time for a change,” the reporter barrels, obliviously, on. “But there was nothing to criticize about tonight. A brace and three assists. It’s like no one could stop you. No one could come close. What are you thinking?”

Steve smiles as the bulbs of camera flashes go off.

What is he thinking?

Well, he’s thinking, for one, that if you have to say _I don’t want to be insulting_ during a post-match press conference, in front of half a dozen members of your professional industry and three cameras televizing the interview on national fucking television, then chances are you don’t care _too_ much about how insulting you’re fucking being.

He’s thinking, for another, that plenty of players played well past 33-fucking-years of age and no one ever stops to ask _Cristiano Ronaldo_ if, at age 35, he’s past his fucking prime and if he should maybe consider an alternative career making a killing in a retirement league like China or the MLS.

He thinking, also, that if the reporter is looking for a fight—and Steve is more than willing to give him a fight, he’s coursing with adrenaline and always about one poorly aimed foul away from pushing himself into an open brawl on the field anyway—then he should have just _named_ the unrepentant asshole who’s been shittalking him all month.

It’s not as though they don’t all know.

It’s not as though their rivalry isn’t all the tabloids ever talk about.

Steve takes in a rattling breath and gives the reporter a smile that would break on impact if anyone so much as breathed on it. Seventeen years he’s been at this club and all anyone ever cares about is what he thinks about _him_.

“Well, Ray, I’m thinking that I had a dream of a game and that my teammates deserve as much credit as I do,” Steve says. “It doesn’t always happen that way—sometimes you have bad games and others are there to pick up your slack. This was a team effort. This entire season has been.”

That’s fine, that’s perfectly diplomatic.

Next to him, Coach Fury sighs. The man doesn’t get paid enough to stop Steve Rogers when he gets that hard glint in his eyes, and the man gets paid quite a bit. He has three separate houses on this continent.

Steve leans in closer to the microphone and his smile takes on a razor-sharp edge.

“But I’m also thinking that the next time you interview James Barnes, you can tell him I’m happy to repeat our derby result from last year when he failed to mark me on four separate occasions and SHIELD won 5-2.”

Fury rubs slowly at his remaining eye. He had long ago given up trying to control the captain of his team and it’s only partially because Steve is generally uncontrollable. It’s mostly because as the manager of one of the biggest clubs in European football, Nicholas J. Fury has enough to worry about without having to deal with Steve’s infamously short temper with his cross-field rival. For example, his contract is up in two years and contract negotiations are a fucking bitch, someone is always trying to rename their playing field to something disgustingly corporate, like the McDonalds Valkyrie Stadium, and the owners of the club had recently spent 72 million pounds on Pietro fucking Maximoff over the summer transfer window.

So yeah, Fury’s hands are full. Also it’s worth more than his life and the multiple multi-million dollar mansions he owns in three different countries to get in between Rogers and Barnes. So good luck, Steve Rogers.

A bunch of tittering breaks out among the reporters.

Steve’s had about as much as he can take.

He gets up from the table, ignoring all of the raised voices and follow up questions, and the camera flashes continue going off in his face.

Shoulders hunched around his ears, his jaw ticking from irritation, he stalks off the stage and goes back to the locker room to shower.

“Coach Fury, do you have anything to add?” he hears the same reporter shout over the din at his Coach.

There’s a moment’s pause and then Fury’s flat voice replying, “Nope. Not now, and not ever.”

*

They met on the field when they were teenagers. Steve, a fresh-faced sixteen year old offensive prodigy out of SHIELD’s youth academy, and James, two years older, bought by HYDRA United from a Russian academy for a pretty neat sum for a teenage defender.

It was Steve’s first game on the SHIELD senior team, a low-stakes friendly game during preseason after a long campaign where SHIELD had fought tooth-and-nail and come solidly in the middle of the table. Still, every season was a fresh start and he was called in by Erskine from the youth academy and given a number—#17—and as he laced up his cleats in the locker room, the stadium filled with singing just outside, he couldn’t think about anything better than this—couldn’t think about spending his life any other way.

Well, maybe friendly was a bit of a misnomer. Could it ever really be _friendly_ when the two most heated rivals in the sport met up to a televised event that even before the beginning of the season was sure to draw a completely sold out stadium? The shittalking had already been pointed and shady as hell and neither team was even playing for anything but preseason pride.

Still, Steve was sixteen years old and pumped full of adrenaline and the unshakeable confidence of talent and youth. He was, also, maybe, a bit naive.

When they shook hands with their cross-country rivals, Steve noticed the boy with the cute curls and the cute dimples, his eyes a bright, blue-grey that made Steve’s stomach clench. Steve wasn’t out—no one in the entire fucking sport was out—but that didn’t mean he couldn’t quietly appreciate the way the boy cocked a crooked grin at him or the way his hand felt firm against Steve’s own. Steve blushed and the boy’s crooked grin widened.

They should never really have been rivals, is the thing.

Steve, as an attacking midfielder, played a completely different position from James, a formidable centre-back.

They would clash on the field, surely, Steve on the offensive and James blocking him, maybe marking him closely during corners and set pieces. They were around the same height and build, after all. It made sense, physically and position-wise. But it would be nothing more than any other cross-field rivalry, just two players doing their jobs, playing their hearts out for the beautiful game.

That’s how it _should_ have been.

It’s unclear to him now what had happened, only that the game was about as friendly as a drunk suckerpunch to the jaw. HYDRA played like theatric, dirty, rotten assholes, diving at the slightest touch and crowding the referee at any marginally favorable call to SHIELD and James was no better. He had Steve marked from the beginning, pushing up into him, shoving his elbow into Steve’s side, crowding up into his back and whispering a string of things Steve didn’t quite register, but which distracted him just enough for James to slide the ball out from between his feet.

Halfway through the game, James made a dirty tackle and denied Steve a clear goal-scoring chance and the referee overlooked it and he had smirked—the asshole had fucking _smirked_ —and then when it was clear he was going to face no consequences for his actions, he fucking _did it again_.

He tackled Steve with both legs, which was an automatic red fucking card, but somehow charmed the referee with a flash of his smile and cock of his head, and Steve had had it, he had lost all sense of reasonability and maybe some of his fresh-faced naivete and he had put both hands on James’s shoulders and shoved him. The two of them got into a heated shouting match that got _Steve_ red carded off the field. During his first match. His fairytale debut with the first team.

And James had just leaned in close to Steve’s ear, as Steve’s face burned with anger and humiliation, just pressed against his seething, heaving shoulders, and said, “Better luck next time, ace.”

There are some things that are fair play over the course of competition and there are some things that are unforgivable, and James’s smirk while Erskine looked deeply disappointed in Steve was one of them.

Let no man say Steve Rogers ever forgot and ever forgave.

  
It had sparked a sixteen year enmity that not only one of them, but both of them shared, and thank fucking god they played on different national teams, because if Steve couldn’t bear to look the arrogant jackass in the face during _derbies_ , he didn’t know how he would have managed to shake his hand and share a locker room with him during something as massive as the World Cup.

*

“Steve, another smashing game!” a different reporter says this time. This one is blond, with a round, chinless sort of face and beams as he taps his pen against his notepad. “That Panenka! Gorgeous! Did you pick up penalty-taking tips from Sergio Ramos?”

Steve chuckles and runs a hand through his sweaty, wet hair.

It had been a rough and tough fight against the Asgardians. Thor Odinson was an absolutely terrifying goalie and their striker—Loki Laufeyson—was as sharp and brutal a shooter in the offense. SHIELD had gone down 0-2 by halftime and it had looked grim, but Steve had rallied his troops in the locker room and Fury had given them an absolutely blistering dressing down after his Captain was done. They had marched out onto the field with renewed determination and Pietro Maximoff had, shockingly, shown why SHIELD’s American owners had been willing to shell out so much for the otherwise uncontrollable and borderline intolerable young talent.

They ended the game 3-2, with Steve having assisted all three goals and gotten one in past Thor himself.

After, the big guy had given a tired laugh, clapped Steve on his shoulder, and told him to watch out for their rematch back in Asgard’s home stadium.

“We might have had lunch the last time I was in the Spanish capital,” Steve says into the microphone with a tired laugh. “Honestly, I got lucky. I saw Odinson move in the right direction and thought that’s it for me.”

There’s a smattering of laughter.

“How are preparations for the derby going?” the blond reporter asks. “SHIELD and HYDRA United are neck-in-neck. The match might decide the title race.”

Steve’s smile takes on a brittle quality. Thank you. As though he wasn’t acutely aware.

“You know, we’re going to do our best,” Steve says. “We’ll leave it all on the field and win or lose—although, hopefully win—SHIELD won’t go out without a fight.”

A pause and the blond reporter’s grin widens sharply. “What kind….of fight?”

Steve freezes and next to him, Fury sighs.

“I’m sure you’ve heard,” the reporter insists. “What James Barnes has been saying about the game. About you, in particular. Have you had any contact with him?”

Steve doesn’t _glare_ at the room of reporters, but that’s not to say the intensity of his stare wouldn’t set all of their notepads on fire if it could.

“No,” he says, stiffly. “James Barnes and I don’t talk and frankly, I’m not interested in what he has to say. Talk is talk. If he wants to show me how superior he is, he can meet me on the field.”

There’s a lot of chittering that breaks out at that.

Next to him, Fury runs a hand over his face.

“All right, I’ll take the next question,” he says and then, before anyone can say anything, “I swear if you ask _me_ about Barnes, you’re not going to get the answer you want.”

Steve’s blood is starting to boil again. James Barnes this and James Barnes that.

Fuck that guy.

If he thinks that Steve’s going to let him humiliate him on the field when he’s spent the entire season running his mouth off on him, then that asshole has another thing coming.

He lets Fury handle the rest of the questions and when the press conference is done, he drains his bottle of water. When he crushes the plastic, he imagines he’s doing so to Barnes’s stupid, terrible, horribly handsome face.

*

SHIELD FC handily wins their next two games while HYDRA United win one and draw one. The table shows them at nearly a dead tie—SHIELD just three points ahead of HYDRA. If SHIELD wins, they’ll pull ahead a full six points, going into the final two months of the season with a lead big enough to somewhat comfortably hold on for the title. If HYDRA wins, then they’re both dead-tied again and the battle goes on until the last match day, probably.

It’s tense. It’s nervy.

Social media and every press conference is a motherfucking bloodbath.

Steve watches them sometimes—the HYDRA post-match interviews. He does it to mentally prepare himself for the big day, and to scope out his enemy.

James sure does a lot of shittalking, but he’s not all bluster. He’s unfortunately really fucking good on the field, practically unparalleled on defense. He is, without a doubt, one of the best centre-backs in the entire world.

It makes Steve so fucking mad.

Not as mad as when James looks into the camera, tilts his head, and winks though. His blue-grey eyes shining with post-match thrill, his sweaty brown curls matted to his forehead, his muscled shoulders—having broadened since they were both teenagers—straining furiously against his tight jersey, and if Steve stops to think for even a second about how easily they could lift him up against a wall, he’s going to give himself a fucking aneurysm.

He refuses to think about it. Or about him. Head empty.

Steve turns off the television. He changes into shorts, grabs his duffel bag, and heads back to the gym.

*

The day of the SHIELD-HYDRA United derby dawns bright and crisp. They’re away at HYDRA’s stadium, so the area is crowded with supporters in black and red, flags with the creepy black-and-red skull leviathan fluttering everywhere, HYDRA chants filling the air. Playing at the Triskelion is always daunting, but SHIELD supporters are the best in the world. They come up north in buses, fans wearing white and black, player names emblazoned across their backs, carrying flags and pennants with the white eagle with white stars against a background of black.

The SHIELD players get off the bus two hours before match time, each busy in his own ritual. Pietro Maximoff is muttering to himself as he wheels his arms wide to warm up, the extra energy running off of him, and Clint Barton is chattering away to Sam Wilson next to him. Sam doesn’t really have pre-game rituals, but he does like to check in with his teammates, which makes him the best vice captain Steve could ever have asked for. As for Steve? He’s listening to a podcast on world politics. Everyone has their thing.

They get off the bus and into the away team locker room. They wind themselves up, change into their kits and cleats. The air is tense, but the energy is high.

“We leave it all on the field,” Steve says, with heat, and his teammates stomp their feet and make noise.

They hear the announcers and Fury gives them the nod.

They’re led out onto the field and the cheers and jeers go up, noise rippling around the stadium, everything resoundingly loud.

Steve swallows his jittery nerves and looks across to see the HYDRA United players at the other end of the field doing their warm ups on the home team side. To his great displeasure, his eyes immediately snag on brown curls and broad shoulders. James Barnes grins at Brock Rumlow and Steve’s stomach clenches again.

He curses under his breath.

“All right, team,” he says to distract himself. “Warm up laps, let’s go!”

  
The referee draws both Steve and James to the center of the field. Steve, with the white Captain’s band on his arm and James with the bright red HYDRA one on his own.

They grip each other’s hands in the middle like they’re trying to crush each other’s bones.

“I’m going to make you eat your words, Barnes,” Steve says through clenched teeth.

James looks at him and his mouth quirks up viciously at the corner.

“You been paying attention to what I’ve been saying, Rogers?”

Steve glares at him and James laughs. His grey-blue eyes sparkle in the mid-morning sun.

“Not the only thing I’ll eat tonight,” James breathes out. “If you’re lucky.”

Steve sucks in a shocked gasp and James cackles as he lets go.

“May the best man win,” Barnes says and smirks.

“I’m going to wipe the fucking grass with you,” Steve grits out.

Then they pull back, the referee blows his whistle, and the beautiful game begins.

  
Jesus Christ it is not beautiful at all. It is a motherfucking bloodbath. There’s dirty tackles and dirty calls, dirty dives and dirty taunting, dirty shoves and dirty elbows digging into sides. Jasper fucking Sitwell slides into Clint 10 minutes in and two minutes later, Rumlow howls and falls to the ground, writhing in “pain.” Sam stares at him, frustrated, yelling, “Man, I didn’t fucking touch you!”

Referees are stupid and Rumlow’s a good terrible actor, because Sam gets a yellow card and Steve kicks the grass in frustration. The crowd boos and cheers in equal parts.

The game goes on.

Barnes shoulders Pietro off course and passes the ball to Grant Ward who, unfortunately, takes it halfway down the field. Clint fails to mark him properly and Ward shoots it to the opposite corner of Bruce. 1-0 to HYDRA. The crowd cheers.

Steve bites out a frustrated groan. Across the field, James winks at him.

It doesn’t last too long. The counterattack is brutal, Pietro running his long legs off, earning that 72 million pound fee, passing it to Steve who turns it around and hoofs it across the field to Sam, who is skilled enough to nutmeg Jack Rollins. The ball goes through the HYDRA player’s legs, Rollins yelling out and lurching forward, but by that point it’s too late. Sam has the ball on the other side, dodges around some 19 year old HYDRA defender, and slides the ball in through Batroc’s legs.

A loud cheer goes up from the SHIELD supporters and Steve piles onto Sam in celebration.

Across the field, James curses, glaring at Steve and Steve shoots him a taunting smile.

1-1 SHIELD.

It goes on like this until half-time—equal parts frustration and open, dirty tactics and by the time SHIELD comes back out of the locker room for the second half of the derby, it’s 2-1 to HYDRA and about as vicious a game as any of them have ever played.

The second half is worse than the first, HYDRA players trying to take out the ankles closest to them and somehow avoiding the worst consequences. Steve is angry by now—winded and frustrated and _furious_ —and half the players on the field have yellow cards.

All it takes is one more shitty foul and one of the teams is going to go down to 10 players.

It’s inevitable, at this point. It’s fucking brutal.

It happens in the stupidest manner possible.

Steve and James are in the SHIELD box, grappling with the ball. James is shoving into Steve’s back, hissing in his ears, trying to get the ball away from him, and Steve is panting, trying to work around him.

James kicks the ball away and it goes to Rumlow.

“Fuck!” Steve curses loudly and behind him Bruce is yelling something.

Rumlow is completely unmarked.

He gears up and Steve is trying to shove at James, who’s trying to shove at him, Steve’s arms in the air, and Rumlow kicks the ball and—

The whistle screeches seconds after it hits Steve’s outstretched arm.

“No!” he screams and hears “ _Fuck yes_ ” behind him.

“Ref, that was an accident!” Steve shouts as he and Sam and Clint find their way to the official. “I was blocking Barnes, that wasn’t—”

“Ref, come on,” Sam is panting, trying. “That was clearly not his intention, that wasn’t—”

The three of them try to appeal, but the referee waits for the call by the VAR official.

It takes fifteen seconds and then he puts up a yellow card and blows his whistle.

“Yellow card to Rogers, penalty to HYDRA!”

There’s audible groans that ring out from the SHIELD players and screams of delight from HYDRA supporters.

“Fuck!” Steve shouts in frustration and shoves his hands into his sweaty hair. “This is a joke! Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

Steve turns around, unwilling to watch Barnes take the penalty.

It doesn’t matter anyway.

Two minutes later, the cheers go up around the Triskelion and Steve knows, with a sinking heart, that they’ve all but lost.

  
In the end the score is 3-2 to HYDRA United, both teams down to 10 players after Maximoff and Sitwell get sent off.

It’s a hard, brutal, awful game and the injustice sits heavily in Steve’s stomach. Losing any game sucks. Losing the derby to their most hated rivals and putting the title race up in the air again when they could have sealed the deal—god, it fucking sucks.

He’s devastated.

“It’s okay,” Sam tries, rubbing Steve’s shoulder in consolation. “The fight’s not over. They got us this time, we’ll get them next. We’re still tied for what matters. And we’re ahead on goal difference. We won’t let any more points drop.”

Steve swallows heavily.

“I can’t do the press conference, Sam,” he says. “I know I should, but—”

“I’ll take care of it,” Sam says and squeezes Steve’s shoulder. “What else is a vice captain for?”

Steve looks at him gratefully and finishes his bottle of water.

He shakes hands with a few HYDRA players and, avoiding Barnes altogether, heads through the tunnel toward the locker room.

*

Whatever you might say about him, Steve Rogers is no coward. He is one of the best midfielders in the world, the long-standing captain of one of the best football teams in the world. He has won multiple titles with his team, including the league once and two Champions League titles. So after he’s finally showered and changed into his track pants and a loose SHIELD FC t-shirt, he starts to feel bad.

It’s not like him to be so unprofessional. Barnes is a total and unrepentant ass, but that shouldn’t have an impact on _Steve_ , not who he is. Not the kind of captain he is.

He sighs and finds Fury.

“Where’s the HYDRA locker room?”

Fury raises one terrifying eyebrow.

“Am I going to have to cover up a crime? Because I really don’t have the time for that, Maximoff is already running his mouth off to the press and you know how I feel about reporters.”

Steve sighs and runs a hand through his wet hair.

“No, Coach,” he says. “Nothing criminal.”

“Okay,” Fury says. “Don’t need to know anymore. Don’t want to know anymore.” He jerks his head. “All the way down the hallway to your left.”

Steve thanks him and, leaving his team behind, goes to find the HYDRA locker room.

  
The HYDRA locker room is as dark and as foul as the away team’s own. The lockers are dark metal, the floor emblazoned with the bright red leviathan skull of the HYDRA. There’s filthy towels piled up in the corner of the room. It smells like sweat and dirt and the rank stink of men. It would be intolerable if Steve hadn’t spent the majority of his life in closed locker rooms with sweaty, stinking men.

There’s no one here.

He clears his throat.

“James?”

No one answers. Steve frowns and steps into the room to look around. It’s possible that Barnes has already left, but he had done the press conference for his own team, and the one staying behind to do that always leaves the locker room last.

“Barnes?” Steve calls out, louder.

When there’s only silence again, Steve sighs and turns. Well, he tried. No one could say he _hadn’t_. Well, no one could say he had either, since no one is around, but whatever it’s the gesture that counts. Probably.

Steve is about to leave when he suddenly hears a rustling behind him.

“Well, well, well,” a familiar voice says. “Look what the HYDRA dragged in.”

Steve exhales furiously. His shoulders are immediately up near his ears, his stomach already clenched with anger. Actually, this was a mistake. There’s being a good, honorable captain and there’s seeking out a multi-headed snake that he sometimes forgets just how much he _hates_ until he hears him open his goddamned mouth.

“Looking for me, _Captain_?” Steve hates the way the word rolls off James’s tongue. He hates the way it makes something hot pool in his stomach.

He turns around, crossing his large arms across his muscular chest. Then his mind goes blank.

Steve stares at James, open-mouthed, like a fish gaping out of water. James, standing there with his dark, wet curls, water dripping down the ends that is running down his broad, bare shoulders and his broad, bare chest in rivulets. He’s clearly just gotten out of the shower, because his skin is warm and blushed and he’s wearing nothing but a towel around his narrow waist and a smirk on his face.

Fuck.

“If you had caught me just a minute earlier I would have invited you in,” James says with a sharp smile and Steve can’t help the way he swallows.

 _Fuck_.

“I just—” he says, scrambling to try and scrape together enough brain cells to form a single sentence. “I—wanted to—”

James gives him an amused look. It’s not mocking so much as it is Knowing.

They’ve known each other since they were teenagers, after all, and they might hate each other’s guts, but there are some things that are unavoidable.

Like the way Steve is never able to keep his eyes off of James.

Like the way James is always leaning into Steve’s body, taunting him directly in his ear.

There’s something hot and heavy pooling in Steve’s stomach and try as he might, he can’t make it go away.

“I wanted to congratulate you,” he says, biting off the ends of the words. “For the. Win.”

James looks surprised for just a moment, before the look of sincere emotion slides off his face, replaced by something sharper, more wicked. His lips are quirked up at the corners, his eyes glinting. He looks like the cat that got the cream.

Steve’s eyes widen and he steps back.

James steps forward.

“Did you?” James says. “You came all the way to the enemy locker room to congratulate me?”

“Um,” Steve says, swallowing. He takes another step back. “Yes? It’s the. Captainly thing to do.”

James laughs, his grin going wider.

“I’m a...professional,” Steve says. He goes for calm and flat and comes up strained.

Steve hates this. His stomach is hurting and his head is buzzing and he hates this.

Quick, where is the door? He had almost made it to the door before, but now he can’t find it, his spacial awareness is zero, all he can see is James, advancing on him, his cat-like grin stretched across his face and his horribly bright eyes, and Steve steps back again in a panic and—

His back hits lockers.

_Fuck._

“I think,” James says and Steve is horrified to find him close now, arguably too close, maybe six inches of space between them. James smells like fresh soap and mint shampoo, his body heat roiling off of him, warming up the parts of Steve’s body he’s nearest to.

“You do?” Steve says dumbly, staring at him—at his enemy, at his most hated person. “Wait, what? Think what?”

James laughs, softly.

“I think it’s very good of you,” he says. “To be so...professional. It’s admirable.”

Steve’s head is spinning. He knows he can get out of this situation, he just knows he can, if he can just capture a single brain cell, if he just tries—

“It is?” he says.

James’s hand is suddenly on Steve’s chest and Steve looks down at it dumbly, is shocked to see the slight tent at the front of James’s towel. Steve’s mouth goes dry.

“Do you know?” James says quietly. “How hot you are?”

“I—” Steve blinks and looks up.

James’s expression has changed. It’s no longer arrogant, no longer set to make Steve’s blood boil. Instead it’s...charged. Hungry. He looks at Steve like he’s _hungry_ for him.

“It drives me crazy,” James says. His fingers are scraping up Steve’s chest, fingertips at his neck, pressing into Steve’s jaw.

The buzzing sound in Steve’s head increases.

“How much you hate me?” Steve gets out.

James laughs and then his expression shutters a little. His palm is against Steve’s cheek.

“Is that what you think?” he says. “That I hate you?”

Steve doesn’t know what to say to that. Of course that’s what he thinks. That’s all he’s ever known, that’s all they’ve ever been to one another—rivals, enemies on the field. Two poles, diametric foes, opposed.

All Steve does is think about how much he hates James and all James does is talk about Steve in interviews, taunt him, mock him, try to catch his attention—

Steve sucks in a breath.

“I hate you,” Steve says. Insists. “I hate your fucking guts.”

James tilts his head just so.

“I don’t know,” he says. “I don’t think you do.”

Steve doesn’t know what to say to that. How does he respond when he says one thing and the person he hates the most—the person he can’t stand—the person he can’t stop thinking ab—

James stops, his fingertips at Steve’s mouth, his eyes boring into Steve’s own.

“Do you, Steve?” he says, softly. Dangerously. “Do you really hate me?”

I do, Steve thinks desperately. Hopes, desperately. I really do.

Somewhere in between his brain and his mouth, something misfires. He thinks one thing, but what he says, is another.

“No,” Steve says.

He’s shocked when the word comes out of his mouth. Not half as shocked as James, it would appear. His enemy’s grey-blue eyes widen, his mouth suddenly slack, its corners soft.

He looks, for the first time in all of the time Steve has known him, disarmed.

“Fuck,” James says.

Steve couldn’t have said it better himself. He takes a deep breath.  
Well, in for a penny, in for a motherfucking pound, he guesses.

Steve Rogers, Captain of SHIELD Football Club, is going for broke.

James has just enough time to suck in a surprised, shocked breath before Steve shoves both hands against his bare chest. James stumbles backwards and Steve gets his hands on James’s shoulders and, wheeling him around, shoves him back against the locker. Hard.

James’s eyes widen in shock and Steve, fingers curling into James’s shoulders, kisses him.

  
Steve has wanted to kiss James Buchanan Barnes since he was sixteen fucking years old, all bright blue eyes and brown curly hair and the slightest dimple in his chin. He’s wanted to kiss him since he saw him on the field, the corners of his plush mouth curving up in a smirk, since he had gripped Steve’s hands in the middle of a field, and said, tauntingly, “Hey. Good game.”

Steve has wanted to kiss James Buchanan Barnes in the same breath he’s wanted to fucking kill him and finally, after all this time, after the brutality of their game and the hard-hit of the loss and the way James always batters into him—just shatters through his carefully constructed, professional walls with a sharp smile and cocky attitude—James Barnes wraps his fingers in Steve’s hair and kisses him back.

Steve opens his mouth and James licks in.

They grapple around the locker room, shoving each other against the lockers, tugging on hair, teeth bumping, tongues clashing, mouth on mouth, heavy breathing and fingers scrabbling, pressing against each other and into each other until the breaths are knocked out of them. James’s towel falls to the ground at some point and he gets Steve’s shirt up and over his head at another.

Steve shoves James, naked as day, against a locker and attaches himself to his neck.

James makes some choice noises, tilts his head back to give Steve better access, and arches into Steve’s touch.

Steve leaves a purple bruise behind, a mark.

They grapple around some more.

This time, James shoves Steve against a locker and his fingers go to the elastic of Steve’s track pants, easily undoing the tie there.

He gets his fingers under the elastic, dipping them into Steve’s underwear, and Steve shoves him back against the nearest wall, his own fingers going to James’s dick.

It’s...crazy. They are certifiably nuts.

Steve’s pulse is beating in his ears and James’s pupils are blown open, just pure dark irises, no white left to be seen, and the two of them kiss again, heated and open and sloppy, more panting between slotted lips than anything else.

They match each other’s strokes, bring each other off.

It’s hot and it’s messy and it’s so fucking stupid that Steve, he—his chest is—his brain is just—

“Fuck,” he breathes out.

James’s head falls back flat against the locker with a clang.

“Jesus,” he says.

Steve makes an indecipherable noise. He can’t seem to catch his breath.

“Well,” James says, after another moment. “That was about seventeen years in the making. Can’t say it disappointed.”

“Shut up,” Steve says, with little to no heat. It’s kind of hard to muster self righteous indignation when he has James’s come on him.

They say nothing for another minute, both of them coming back down from their highs, sucking in air to try and calm their racing hearts.

Eventually, James has the wherewithal to shove Steve off of him. He finds his towel again and wipes himself off before throwing it at Steve.

Steve cleans himself up, tucks himself back in, and finds his shirt.

By the time he’s dressed again, James has pulled on track pants of his own.

“Tell no one,” Steve says. “I’m serious. This dies with us.”

James shoves a t-shirt on over his head and gives Steve a smirk.

“This time, sure,” James says. “What about next time?”

“There will be no next time,” Steve says loudly. “This was just. One time. A pent up release.”

James snickers and grabs his track jacket.

“Uh huh,” he says.

“I’m never coming into your locker room again,” Steve says. “I have no intention of doing that.”

“I’m sure you don’t,” James says. He unscrews his bottle of water and drains it. When he turns back to Steve, it’s with a weird look in his eye. There’s a glint there, something Steve doesn’t like. “What about when I find myself in yours?”

Steve pales at that.

“What?”

“What about, Steve,” James says and now he’s smiling—he’s full-on smirking. “When I find myself in _your_ locker room? What will you do then?”

Steve isn’t one to be flustered. He’s known to be calm (relatively), and level-headed (sort of). He is the fucking Captain of SHIELD FC, a veteran player, and one of the most respected on-field midfielders of all time. Three seasons ago, he was up for the Balon fucking D’Or.

Steve balks.

James cackles. What a _fucking_ asshole.

Steve’s cheeks are hot as James lifts his duffel bag over his shoulder.

Just before he leaves the room, he leans in close to Steve, his mouth brushing the shell of Steve’s ear.

“See you soon, Captain.”

His fingers trail over Steve’s shoulder and Steve’s left with uncontrollable shivers and a headache he will never be able to get rid of.

*

It’s almost more literal than that.

A month later, Steve is sitting next to Fury, the bright orange microphone in front of him.

“Steve—Captain Rogers!” a familiar reporter with brown hair says. “Great game, as always. HYDRA dropped points last week and SHIELD almost has the title in the bag, but you know that’s not what everyone is talking about. What do you have to say? We’re dying to know.”

Steve bites his lower lip and next to him, Fury sighs.

“About what?” Steve asks.

The room lights up with loud, relentless chittering.

The reporter raises his voice above all others. “You know, Captain. Reports that SHIELD Football Club has signed James Buchanan Barnes from its bitter rivals.”

What does Steve have to say about that? _What does Steve have to say?_

There’s a string of horrible, embarrassing, infuriating texts from a number he refuses to officially save and can’t stop replying to that says more than he could ever put into words. Or would want to, for that matter.

Still, he’s the Captain and this is a shocking, unbelievable steal. This, all of this, is all for the love of the beautiful game.

“I would say,” Steve says and swallows his own sigh. He looks into the camera and smiles. “Welcome to SHIELD FC, James Barnes. I look forward to seeing you in the locker room.”

* * *

**Author's Note:**

> Yes I did name HYDRA after Manchester United and no I will not be apologizing.
> 
> For those subscribed to me, I am so sorry for your notifications as of late--this will be my last fic/ficlet for the upcoming week at least, so phew!
> 
> \+ Fic can be retweeted [here](https://twitter.com/spacerenegaydes/status/1348752891226411008?s=20), if you enjoy it!
> 
> \+ Catch me on Twitter, if you'd like: [@spacerenegaydes](https://twitter.com/spacerenegaydes).


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